ANDREW MURRAY wonders what the great communist foe of Oswald Mosley would make of today’s far-right surge, warning that while the triumph of Farage and ‘Robinson’ is far from inevitable, placing any faith in Starmer in an anti-fascist front is a fool’s errand
Grant Shapps, civil contingencies, and the right to strike
The latest plans to suppress industrial action are chilling. They are the hallmark of authoritarian government – and worse, argues Prof KEITH EWING
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps
LOTTE COLLETT welcomes the arrival of a new party for the left, a vehicle for councils to finally fight for progressive policies on housing, green spaces and public facilities, rather than administering cuts and misery from central government
KEVAN NELSON reports back from a delegation to the epic celebrations for the anniversary of Vietnam’s 1945 revolution, where British communists found a thriving, prosperous socialist country, brimming with ambition and well-earned national pride
Our economic system is broken – and unless we break with the government’s obsession with short-termist private profit, things are destined to get worse, warns Mercedes Villalba
Following the resignation of Nepali Prime Minister KP Oli amid mass youth-driven protests, different narratives have circulated which simplify and misrepresent the complexities and reality on the ground in Nepal at the roots of this crisis, argue VIJAY PRASHAD and ATUL CHANDRA
The US is desperate to stop Honduras’s process of social and democratic change, writes TIM YOUNG
GOVERNMENT powers to deal with peacetime emergencies are contained in the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, Part II.
The Act applies to war, terrorism, and environmental disasters, as well as to “events or situations” which threaten “serious damage to human welfare.”
Although a strike could in theory cause the Act to be invoked (though it has never happened), emergency regulations may not “prohibit or enable the prohibition of participation in, or any activity in connection with, a strike or other industrial action.”
More from this author
A Labour government would be wise to implement new recommendations from the ILO that would protect trade unionists and their right to bargain collectively, writes Professor KEITH EWING
New writing has underlined the importance of the 1873 case that victimised striking farmworkers and led to a national outcry — yet aspects of the law used against them remain on the books, writes professor KEITH EWING
On the 50th anniversary of the jailing the Pentonville Five, Professor KEITH EWING recalls how British governments, Tory and Labour, have systematically adapted the law to suppress legitimate trade union activity
Severely rattled by the ongoing rail dispute, the Tories are looking at ways to force ‘minimum servicing,’ agency strike-breakers and a massive increase in damages onto the unions, writes Professor KEITH EWING
